Genghis Khal
by JakeCrown
Summary: Genghis Khal is known as the greatest and fiercest conquerer of all time. In the span of a single lifetime, he transformed the shape of the world. He took his people from savage and tribal living of nomadic subsistence and forged them into the masters of the world. His enemies drowned in blood. His people ride from one side of the word to the other.
1. Chapter 1

Genghis Khal is known as the greatest and fiercest conquerer of all time. In the span of a single lifetime, he transformed the shape of the world. He took his people from savage and tribal living of nomadic subsistence and forged them into the masters of the world. His enemies drowned in blood. His people ride from one side of the word to the other.

All shall remember the Stallion Who Mounted The World.

All shall remember Genghis Khal.

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Chapter One: Temujin The Boy

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"Yesugei was a great Khal. It is known." Hoelun, my mother, told me. It did little to stop the stinging in my eyes. She did not cry as we watched the burned pyre smolder. Neither did I. 'Khals never cry.' My father had said. He is gone now.

"Why did they leave us?" I asked her. The tents of the Khalasaar had been gone when I rose this morning. I have spent my entire life surrounded by the people, slaves and horses of a Khalasaar. It was silent other than the crackling of the pyre of my father and the breathing of my mother's mare and my stallion. My Father's horse had fallen to an arrow and crushed my father.

"The blue Khalasaar was defeated by the red painted Khalasaar. Khal Ong now rules the blue tribe. The Great Stallion rides with him." She spoke to me. Confusion wars with sorrow in my mind. "But why are we alone, Mother? Where are our slaves? Where are Father's Bloodriders? Where is Borte? She is to be my wife."

Hoelun turned from the smoldering embers of my father and looked at me with a sad expression. "The Khalasaar has abandoned us. Your father's Bloodriders died honorably in battle against the red tribe. The slave were taken by those stronger than us in our moment of weakness. Borte is the daughter of Dei. Dei is your enemy now. He was a Ko of Khal Yesugei, but now, he is Ko of Khal Ong. She will not be your wife." My guts twisted with sickness and hunger. I felt bile rise in my throat and swallowed it back down with a grimace.

Mother grabbed my chin and directed my face to look at her. "You are a boy Temujin. You are a tall boy now. You can ride and shoot a bow. Your father is dead. It is time for Temujin the boy to die and Temujin the man to be born. I will not make the ride to join the Dosh Khaleen alive without your father's Bloodriders." I started to interrupt her.

"But mother, I can..." She cut me off with a yell. "Silence! Listen to my words! You were born to be great. When you came from me, You were gripping a clot of blood in your hand. It is a sign that you will be a great Khal, it is known. Be the man you were meant to be. Your boyhood is over."

She cupped my face in her hands, tears streaming from her eyes now. "Your braid is still too short to start a Khalasaar yet. You have so much more to learn. A woman cannot teach you to be a man. There are others though, in the lands outside the great grass sea. It is said that in the city of the Black goat that a great Khal with fifty thousand riders was defeated by three thousand men. I want you to go to these people and learn their secrets. Grow your braid long. Return to your people a true Khal."

I looked at my mother in confusion. "Mother, I don't want to leave you alone." I spoke as I gripped her tightly. I had grown almost as tall as she. I gripped her tightly and fought back the unmanly tears building in my eyes. I smelled the scent of my mother's hair. Mare's cheese and the grass flowers she often braided into her graying hair. "I want you to promise me something, blood of my womb." she whispered into my ear.

"Anything mother. Just don't send me away." I answered her, my voice strained with withheld tears.

"Promise that you will avenge your Father. Promise that you will become a great Khal." She whispered.

"I swear on the Womb of the World." Was my reply.

She released me and smiled at me through her tears.

"Men keep their words."

Before I could stop her, she unsheathed the knife on my belt with a jerk and stuck it deep into her own chest.

"Noooooo!" I did not stop the tears that fell from my eyes as I cried out. I gripped her tightly and pulled the knife out of her with a jerk. As I cradled her to my chest, she whispered her dying words through the blood pouring from her lips.

"Men keep their words." She spoke as the light left her eyes and she left me alone in the great grass sea.

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	2. Chapter 2

Temujin is is an orphan and eleven years old, alone. Genghis Khal was not always rich and powerful. He started out as most do.

With nothing.

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Chapter Two: Temujin the Lost

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The sour dried curd of mare's milk was as hard as a rock. For once, I did not complain about the bitter and spoiled flavor. There were a few strips of raw hare meat, tenderizing under my saddle. It would not be fit for eating for a few more days yet. The salty flavor of my stallion's sweat was my favorite meat cure. Food was not far as long as I had my mother's mare. If only my mother was here to tend her cooking fire again.

I tried to stop myself from thinking any more of her. It hurt to think of my mother. How I would never hold her to me. Never smell her hair. Never see her smiling over at me as we rode through the grassland together. Her body was ash with my father's now, two weeks ride to the north.

The thoughts were banished from my mind as well as I could. A bird flew through the air ahead of me and over the hill. I kicked my stallion, Yollo, on a straight path along the river. I can shoot a bird in flight, but, there is no need to risk an arrow over a bird. Especially since I don't know how to cook.

I wonder how large the Great Grass Sea really is. Has anyone been able to go from one side to the other before? One day, I will have a Khalasaar so large that the tents will stretch from one end to the other. Then I will count the tents. I will know how large the sea is then.

I saw some smoke in the distance. Courious, I slowed Yollo to a stop. The worn saddle's leather creaked slightly as I slid down from it. I strung my bow with a grunt and climbed back into the saddle. My bow was made by my father. I had spent years gaining the strength to pull it back. Few boys... Men my age could shoot a bow like mine.

"Fly Yollo." I kicked my stallion into a gallop. Colu, the mare, was tethered to the saddle and began to match the speed of Yollo.

I slowed as I neared the location of the fire. I stopped on top of a hill overlooking the section of river ahead of me. My eyes strained to make out what I was seeing. I moved off Yollo and moved closer, crouched in the tall grass. A giant cart floated in the water, aflame, as men that were not Dothraki jumped off and swam to the bank of the river. I could see other carts following after the flaming one.

I had heard of these carts before. Boats they are called. I had never seen one before. I watched for a little while longer as the three river carts following the first stopped in the river and started to walk across a narrow strip of wood onto land.

The men from the flaming boat are raising their hands in the air or laying on the ground as the men from the other boats approach. The ones approaching bring their straight arakhs to bare and begin to butcher the prone and unresisting men nearest to them. I could hear the men cry out cowardly. Few ran. I could not help but wonder why these men did not resist or flee. These men must be the Lamb-men I had heard of that live in the southern area of the sea.

They waited, docile, to be killed. This must be one of the secrets my mother spoke of.

A few men star to run away. I lead Yollo and Colu back to the bottom of the hill and out of sight. They started to graze and stayed near where I left them. I run back up the hill and watched the outlanders.

A score or so horses ran down the wooden bridge. They began to chase over the hill after the men that had run away when the slaughter of the others began. I could see the curve of proper Dothraki curved bows in some of the men's hands.

I could see a long braid flying in the wind from the top of the lead rider's head. They quickly caught up with the men. I could hear their wails of despair from the top of the hill I was crouched on. I watched with bated breath. The running men were not killed like the others, to my confusion. I watched as, surrounded they began to walk slowly back to where the butchers set up their camp. They sat weeping under guard of the horsemen.

Will they reveal their secrets to my spying?

The 'butcher men' had been erecting tents and starting campfires while the chase had been going on. Smart of them. The moon and stars will soon have reign over the sky. The butchers began to dig in the ground for some reason.

What strange people these outlanders are.

As dusk approached, I grew bored. Under the darkening sky, I walked down the hill to my horses. I unstrung my bow and unsaddled Yollo. After hobbling them, I milked Calu into a skin for a few monents. After there was enough milk, I moved over to her neck. She stood motionless as I made a small cut on her scarred neck. I caught the squirts of blood in the skin and looked to the sky. The Father Sun painted the horizon blue, cream, and, pink as he let Mother Moon have her turn at control of the sky.

I heard screams over the hill in the butcher's camp. I held my thumb over Calu's cut to stop the bleeding with one hand and shook the skin into a froth with the other. I could not contain my curiosity of what secrets were being revealed to cause the screams. When the bleeding was stemmed, I made my way back up the hill and crouched down to watch.

The five men who had run were being held on their knees as long spear poles were being pushed at their bottoms, I sipped my blood-milk and watched, equally disgusted and confused, as the lamb-men squealed and screamed. After the poles were in deep, The poles were planted into the ground, with the men spitted on the top like a bird over a fire.

Were they going to cook them?

The butchers drank and laughed as they made merry with their... Wifes? Slaves? I watched all night, trying to make sense of what I was seeing. The screams died off less than an hour after they were on the pole. I sat upon the hill considering what exactly was the purpose of what I was seeing.

I sat all night. I watched as the poled men slowly moved lower down the poles as time passed. My emotions were somewhere near disgust and fear as I watched the moaning bodies flicker with the campfire's light.

Eventually, near dawn, I had an epiphany. For running these men are being punished with a death far crueler than a quick death with a weapon. The Lamb-men feared the butchers so much that they just laid down and let themselves be butchered like lambs without a peep of protest. These are the secrets my mother wanted me to learn. The secret power of fear. There must be so many secrets to learn from these outlanders.

Soon after dawn, the butchers broke camp and began to quickly load all their objects back into their water-carts. Before leaving, a tall Andal stood before the poled men and spoke a few words I could not hear. The tall man was wearing a strange metal skin and a strange cloak of many colors down his back. He carried a spear and thrust it into the stomachs of all five men that had slowly moved lower down the poles.

I heard them cry out one by one as the spear entered their guts. After stabbing the last man, the tall Andal joined the last water-cart. As the butchers floated away, I went back to my horses and strung my bow once more.

After a drink from Calu's teats I then saddled Yollo. Riding into the campground of the butchers, I almost turned away from the smell. I rode up closer to the poled men. Up close to them, I could make out their features. Two Andals, Two Rhoynar and a fellow Dothraki. One of the Andals noticed me as I rode up and I could see the tears running dripping down his face as the blood dripped down his pole.

He spoke to me in a foreign language I had heard some slaves speak before. I understood few of the words his parched throat gave to me. I just looked at him and wondered what crime he and the men of the flaming craft had committed to earn their deaths.

"Please kill me." I heard the Dothraki speak. I tilted my head and looked at him. "What crime did you all commit to deserve such a punishment?" I asked as I gestured to him and the bodies in the camp in turn.

"We deserted the Windblown." he said as the Andal became hysterical and cried out loudly in his slave language.

"What are the Windblown? What do they to that you desert them?" I asked as I notched an arrow into my bow. I raised the bow and pointed it at him.

My kinsman's face seemed relieved at a sooner death and begins to speak over the Andal's womanly blubbering. "The Windblown are a group of men who do battle for great gifts of gold, slaves, and ,wine. I deserted because I am tired of battle." He spoke.

I could not contain my laughter as I rode away. I spoke over my shoulder to the doomed man. "You think a Khal should reward you for running from battle? Die like the coward you are."

The coward's answer made all that I had seen make sense. Also it gave me a goal. Find the Windblown and receive great gifts and meet honourable battle while I learned their secrets.

I will keep my word mother...


	3. Chapter 3

With great hopes of learning the secrets of the Outlanders, Temujin rides south along the Rhoyne River.

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Chapter Three: Temujin The Befuddled

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Yollo screamed as he lay on his side. His back leg is at an odd angle and obviously broken. It is my fault. Galloping along a riverbank for days on end, you are bound to run into a hole eventually. I run my knife along his neck to end his suffering.

I remember Mother teaching me how to shoot a bow from the back of Yollo. Riding along this very river, with my Father, to collect gifts from the settlements along it. I have had Yollo as long as I can remember the sun and stars. He was a good horse. I mourn him as I do my parents.

No tears fall from my eyes. Men do not cry. I am a man.

"I will not rush again, Yollo. I'm sorry." I speak to his spirit.

It takes a full day to cut my saddle out from underneath Yollo. A quarter-moon to carve the saddle to Calu's size. With the time it took, all chances of catching the fast moving water-cart were gone. I will find another Windblown. If one group can be given great gifts for battle, there must be others.

I made a slow ride through the plains south. I came upon a well worn path next to the river. The pat had the grooves of carts going back and forth along it. I could pick up speed along it.

Many days later, I came upon a outlander city that my Father had received gifts from. There would be no battles there. Worms, my father called them. A city of worms. I continued south along the river for another moon.

Little towns and small Khalasaars were passed and ignored. I began to pass groups of people riding carts of the path. They became more common than not. I ignored them, mostly. They spoke the main slave tongue, dragon-speak. I could understand most of the insults to my honor they threw as I rode by on the path. A single Dothraki with one horse was ignored in return. Calu, hares, and, marmots kept me well fed.

I had no need to stop.

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As I began to smell the poison water, I came to the end of the river and saw a grand sight. A city with black walls that towered into the sky. The river was thick with water-carts of many sizes. The path was thick with people entering the city.

'This is not a city of Worms.' I thought to myself. 'It is a city of stench.' Maybe, in a city this big, the Windblown will be here.

Rows of horseless men stood at the gates of the city. They carried short spears and large shields. Hats with a large bronze spike stuck out of the top were atop all of their heads. There was a line of carts and people waiting to enter. Not wanting to cause commotion in an unknown place, I joined the line. The sun was half down by the time my turn to enter the gate came.

"Whats a young horselord doing alone entering Volantis?" Spoke what I assume is the head guard. He was fat and looked slow, though his arms were thick with muscle. I hate speaking the slave tongue, though my mother forced me to learn it. All Khals must speak the trader-slave tongue. I feel dirty every time the foreign words exit my lips.

"I am here to join the Windblown. I come to receive great gifts for glorious battle." I told the sentry the truth with a grimace at using the slave tongue.

He started to laugh. "You, a sell-sword. Ha! They will eat you alive boy!" The fat guard boomed.

I felt heat come to me and shouted back. "I am a man! I keep my word and will not run from death in battle!" I felt my hand inching for my whip when he replied once more.

"The Windblown have already left. The Golden Guests and and The Guests of the Cat are both hiring at the market, straight down this road. Next!" The chubby spear-wielder shouted for the next person. I put Calu to trot while glaring at the rude guard.

I soon forgot about the insults as I rode through the bustling city. There were people of every color and size. A blue breaded man in bright green robes threw many flaming sticks into the air and caught them without dropping any. Naked girls, painted all kinds of colors, pulled men into shadowed alleys. Merchants, like I had seen in Vaes Dothrak, screamed and yelled in the dragon-speak ever louder to be heard over one another.

"Thief!" Was shouted as more spike capped fat men ran uselessly after a quick footed man clutching a large golden cup. Overcome is the only way to describe my feelings the first time through a Outlander's city. I would say that I liked it, other than the stench that permeated.

Soon enough, I spotted a flag with a cat on it, waving in the breeze, atop a giant spear. Under the flag was a table. Around the table were the ugliest Andals I had ever laid eyes upon. No horses around them. No slaves lavished them nor jewels hung from them. Covered in foreign and drinking from wooden cups, they were not as gifted as I was imagining.

It was difficult to ride past them without staring. Soon I came to men seated around another table. This one had a giant spear with a golden skull atop it. The half dozen men sitting around the table were also Andals, though seemed far richer. They wore thick bands of gold up and down their arms. Golden jewel studded armor and jewelled swords.

I rode up to them and dismounted my mare. The Andals stared at me as I walked up to the table. A red haired one said something in their strange slave tongue I could not understand, before they all started laughing.

"I'm here to battle for great gifts." I said to the man in the middle. He was not old, but, not young either. No grey in his black beard or hair. He had big ears and a crooked jaw. "We don't take boys, go back home to your mother." Was the answer I received in the dragon-tongue.

"I am a man. I can ride, fight and shoot. I am the last of my Khalasaar. My home is the back of my horse. My mother is dead." I said defiantly. "I will not run from battle." I added remembering the Windblown atop sticks. The red haired Andal began to say something. Before he could finish, the big eared one interrupted him and began to speak to me.

"You are young. You will most likely die within the first couple of battles. Why should we waste good gold paying you just for you to die on us in a couple months?" He asked. I remembered the men on poles once more.

"I will stay. I will learn. I will kill as ordered and never desert. I am a man who keeps his word." I said. I kept my face from showing the fear of rejection I felt. I must join these men. I must learn. I must become a great Khal.

What would my mother think if I failed to learn the secrets of these outlanders...

The big eared Andal did not smile at me, but I sensed satisfaction in his reply. "Usually men sign a five year contract, but since you are young and must be taught much... You have to sign a fifteen year contract to join us." I felt some strange sense of dread, but, asked anyway. "What is a contract?"

The big eared one lifted a feather and began to make strange markings of a piece of white cloth as he spoke. "It is an agreement of words put down on paper." He gestured with the hand he was not making markings with to the strange cloth.

The wind left me at the implication. "You can put words into those marking!" I exclaimed, shocked. The thoughts of how easy it would be to take advantage of words saved without having to remember every detail.

"Yes. My name is Myles Toyne. What is yours?" He continued.

My mind still felt strange from the idea of 'putting down' words that my mouth answered before my mind understood the question.

"Genghis" was the word on my lips as it was on my mind.

In Dothraki, It meant 'Divine' 'Greatest' 'Best' 'Grandest' and everything to describe the best thing. Hearing about writing for the first time, I could think of nothing else.

It's not arrogance on my part to give myself that name.

I couldn't just tell the man I just told that I keep my word that I just lied to him.

With a name like that though, I don't want to.

Fifteen years.

Mother...

I will learn their secrets and grow a braid all Khals will envy.

I signed the contract.


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